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I don't know about that. If things were bad enough that command fell to LaForge, then he might be needed more in Engineering than on the Bridge. Worf might make a better choice for command, because if the shit has hit the fan, then Worf's "shoot first, ask questions at the inquiry" approach might be the best one for them to survive to reach an inquiry!

Meanwhile the Enterprise served as a "training ship" for other engineers to be assigned to future Galaxy-Class ships or ships with the new systems the Enterprise had. (Hence the rotating series of engineers we see in the first season.)

This really makes a lot of sense and ties in the rotating Chief Engineers nicely.

And if you add in the Technical Manual's reference to Starfleet initially only putting six Galaxies into service at a rate of one a year), and keeping the parts for more in reserve, a year of that would have built up all the Galaxy-experienced chiefs they needed for the immediate future.

I wonder if any of those first year engineers ended up serving on the Yamato or the Odyssey...

...One might actually argue that with such an automated ship, the only thing they would ever need is engineers. The automation takes care of commanding, piloting, researching, communicating and diplomacy. And the engineers take care of the automation!